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remembered that I had left a jade bracelet, Shayl’s present, in the outer chamber.
    My door slid open. Mother stood in front of Button’s room, weeping.

    Both Shayl and my tests dominated the next few days.
    When I got up, I walked through the botanical gardens near my tower to a training center and sat before screens and scanners while cyberminds tested my brain chemistry, reactions, and reflexes, then displayed questions for me to answer. The lenses and lights of the artificial intelligences winked at me as their questions and diagrams danced across the screen, and their soft but stilted voices chattered. I had been tested often enough before and could not imagine what else they would learn about me, but these tests were longer and more extensive than those I had undergone earlier.
    During the afternoon, I would put on a circlet and find myself in a ship about to crash, then in a garden tending flowers, then with a small infant, then with a patrolwoman aiding a lost child. I moved through so many scenarios that I soon lost track of the number.
    At the end of each day, several old women, all psychologists, questioned me; their inquiries seemed either obvious or silly.
    “What is a boy?”
    “Which would you rather be, an architect or a veterinarian, and why?”
    “If a close friend lied to you about a trivial matter, and you discovered the lie, what would you do about it?”
    “If you were in love with someone, and she didn’t love you, what would you do about it?”
    “Why must men live outside?”
    In the evening, I came home to dinner and then a visit from Shayl. One night, she took me over to her rooms, which were near the top of her tower, and we stood on her balcony and looked up at the stars. On another night, we went through my possessions as she advised me on what I should leave behind.
    I had no time to think of Mother. She was a silent presence at dinner, and withdrawn at other times. I assumed that she was trying to reconcile herself to the loss of Button whenever I thought about her at all.

    On the last day of my tests, I was sent through the curving corridors of the center to a small room.
    An old woman I hadn’t met before was sitting behind a desk. Her face was wrinkled, her chin sagged, and her hair was gray. She, like Eilaan, had reached that time in her life when rejuvenation begins to fail and a woman starts to prepare for death. This woman, I was sure, had seen almost two centuries of life, and I wondered if she would be sorry to leave it. Then I asked myself why, if we could live this long, we could not find a way to live as long as we chose. Before I could ruminate on an answer to that question, I was thinking of the men outside and of how short their lives were in comparison to ours.
    “My name is Bren,” the old woman said as she stood up and led me to the couch. A console with a small screen sat on the table before us; Bren pressed a few keys, gazed at the lettering, then turned toward me. “I am to be your adviser, Laissa. I’m here to deal with any problems you might have during this time of transition, when you’re preparing for the future course of your life.”
    I said, “I’ve already decided to do physics.”
    “Let me ask you something, then. Are you planning to do physics because you really want to, because something in you cries out for a deep understanding of the physical universe, or because your friend Shayl is studying that subject?”
    I hesitated. At last I said, “I would have considered it anyway, but I’ll do better at it with a friend to help me.”
    Bren’s smile seemed stiff; her small black eyes were glassy. “I recommend that you consider the general science course instead. You’ll get some physics there, and you can always explore the subject in more depth later. But I would also suggest that you supplement your studies with some work in history and human culture.”
    I was stunned. Swallowing hard, I tried to compose myself. “I’m not interested